An exact solution is obtained for coupled dilaton and electromagnetic field in a cylindrically symmetric spacetime where an axial magnetic field as well as a radial electric field both are present. Depending on the choice of the arbitrary constants our solution reduces either to dilatonic gravity with pure electric field or to that with pure magnetic field. In the first case we have a curvature singularity at a finite distance from the axis indicating the existence of the boundary of a charged cylinder which may represent the source of the electric field. For the second case we have a singularity on the axis. When the dilaton field is absent the electromagnetic field disappears in both the cases. Whereas the contrary is not true. It is further shown that light rays except for those proceeding in the radial direction are either trapped or escape to infinity depending on the magnitudes of certain constant parameters as well as on the nature of the electromagnetic field. Nature of circular geodesics is also studied in the presence of dilaton field in the cylindrically symmetric spacetime.

Clover detector has been used as a Compton polarimeter to measure the linear polarization of γ-rays produced in heavy ion fusion reaction. The polarization sensitivity of the clover detector has been measured over γ-ray energies ranging from 386 to 1368 ke V. The E1 multipolarity of the 1117 keV transition in 99Rh has been established using this polarimeter. This has resulted in the assignment of negative parity to the band head at 3710 keV in 99Rh.

Excitation functions for evaporation residues of the system 16O + 165Ho have been measured up to 100 MeV. Recoil range distribution of long lived reaction products were measured at 16O beam energy of 100 MeV. Detailed Monte Carlo simulation of recoil range distributions of products were performed with the help of PACE2 code, in order to extract the contributions of incomplete fusion in the individual channels. The results clearly show the incomplete fusion contributions in the tantalum and thulium products. This is confirmed by the predictions of breakup fusion model of the incomplete fusion.

Some problems associated with the use of the maximum entropy principle, namely, (i) possible divergence of the series that is exponentiated, (ii) input-dependent asymptotic behaviour of the density function resulting from the truncation of the said series, and (iii) non-vanishing of the density function at the boundaries of a finite domain are pointed out. Prescriptions for remedying the aforesaid problems are put forward. Pilot calculations involving the ground quantum eigenenergy states of the quartic oscillator, the particle-in-a-box model, and the classical Maxwellian speed and energy distributions lend credence to our approach.

Transition amplitudes and transition probabilities for the two-photon 1s–2s transition in the hydrogen atom and 11s–21s transition in helium atom have been calculated using a partial-closure approach. The dominant term is calculated exactly and the remaining sum over intermediate states is calculated using a mean excitation energy. Our value of the transition amplitudes agree within 2% with the exact results for the hydrogen case. Our value of the transition probability for hydrogen is 8.50 s−1 which is in good accord with its known value 8.226 s−1. For helium, the photon energy distribution of the metastable 21s state is in good agreement with the accurate values. The corresponding transition probability is 53.7 s−1 which is in good agreement with the accurate value 51.3 s−1.

We present a numerical investigation of quantum mechanical tunneling process in a double well potential with fluctuating barrier. The tunneling probability and rate are calculated for two cases in which (i) the height of the barrier is undergoing harmonic oscillation with frequency θ and (ii) the height of the barrier is undergoing random fluctuation with frequency θ. It is observed that in both cases, the quantum mechanical tunneling probability and rate exhibit a maximum as a function of the fluctuation frequency. The optimal frequency i.e. the frequency at which rate exhibits a maximum shows a strong isotopic mass effect.

The effect of coupling two chaotic Nd:YAG lasers with intracavity KTP crystal for frequency doubling is numerically studied for the case of the laser operating in three longitudinal modes. It is seen that the system goes from chaotic to periodic and then to steady state as the coupling constant is increased. The intensity time series and phase diagrams are drawn and the Lyapunov characteristic exponent is calculated to characterize the chaotic and periodic regions.

Phase conjugation in a Kerr nonlinear waveguide is studied with counter-propagating normally incident pumps and a probe beam at an arbitrary angle of incidence. Detailed numerical results for the specular and phase conjugated reflectivities are obtained with full account of pump depletion. For sufficient strengths of the pump a normal mode splitting is demonstrated in both the specular and the phase conjugated reflectivities of the probe wave. The splitting is explained in terms of a simple model under undepleted pump approximation.

We present a random matrix ensemble where real, positive semi-definite matrix elements, x, are log-normal distributed, exp[−log2(x)]. We show that the level density varies with energy, E, as 2/(1+E) for large E, in the unitary family, consistent with the expectation for disordered conductors. The two-level correlation function is studied for the unitary family and found to be largely of the universal form despite the fact that the level density has a non-compact support. The results are based on the method of orthogonal polynomials (the Stieltjes-Wigert polynomials here). An interesting random walk problem associated with the joint probability distribution of the ensuing ensemble is discussed and its connection with level dynamics is brought out. It is further proved that Dyson’s Coulomb gas analogy breaks down whenever the confining potential is given by a transcendental function for which there exist orthogonal polynomials.

The present paper attempts to study the Neel temperature of bilayer antiferromagnetic cuprate YBa2Cu3O6.2 within anisotropic Heisenberg model. The double time Green’s function formalism within random phase approximation (RPA) has been used to obtain various correlation functions. The magnetization and the Neel temperature (TN) are evaluated. It is observed that the ratio of intrabilayer to inplane exchange coupling (r=J⊥/J‖) plays an important role in the magnetic dynamics of bilayer systems. The recent experimental data of bilayer system YBa2Cu3O6.2 have been used to estimate the ratio r from the expression for Neel temperature. The estimated values of spin gap and the ratio of hopping matrix elements t⊥/t‖ are found to be in fairly good agreement with the existing experimental results.

We have calculated the anisotropic frequency dependent dielectric function for the 1T and 2H phases of TaS2 and TaSe2 using the linear muffin tin orbital method within the atomic sphere approximation. We find significant anisotropy in the frequency dependent dielectric function for the 1T and 2H phases at low energies (less than 4 eV). Unfortunately there are no experimental data to compare with. The averaged dielectric function agrees with the available experimental data except that the calculated peak heights are underestimated and shifted to higher energies by 1–2eV.

Novello et al [1,2] have shown that it is possible to find a pair of canonically conjugate variables (written in terms of gauge-invariant variables) so as to obtain a Hamiltonian that describes the dynamics of a cosmological system. This opens up the way to the usual technique of quantization. Elbaz et al [4] have applied this method to the Hamiltonian formulation of FRW cosmological equations. This note presents a generalization of this approach to a variety of cosmologies. A general Schrödinger wave equation has been derived and exact solutions have been worked out for the stiff matter era for some cosmological models. It is argued that these solutions appear to hint at their possible relevance in the early phase of cosmological evolution.

The bacteriorhodopsin molecule absorbs light and undergoes a series of structural transformation following a well-defined photocycle. The complex photocycle is transformed to an equivalent level diagram by considering the lifetime of the intermediate states. Assuming that only B and M states are appreciably populated at any instant of time, the level diagram is further simplified to two-level system. Based on the rate equations for two-level system, an analytic expression for the absorption coefficient of bacteriorhodopsin molecule is derived. It is applied to study the behaviour of absorption coefficient of bacteriorhodopsin film in the visible wavelength region of 514 nm. The dependence of absorption coefficient of bacteriorhodopsin film on the thickness of the film, total number density of active molecules and initial number density of molecules in B-state is presented in the graphical form.